Robotic surgical systems and devices are well suited for use in performing minimally invasive medical procedures, as opposed to conventional techniques that may require large incisions to open the patient's body cavity to provide the surgeon with access to internal organs. For example, a robotic surgical system may be used to facilitate imaging, diagnosis, and treatment of tissues that may lie deep within a patient or that may be preferably accessed only via naturally occurring pathways such as blood vessels or the gastrointestinal tract. One such robotic surgical system that may be used in such a minimally invasive procedure is a robotic catheter system. A robotic catheter system uses a robot, external to the patient's body cavity, to insert a catheter through a small incision in a patient's body cavity and guide the catheter to a location of interest.
Typically, elongate members, for example catheters, are inserted into a body of a patient through a small incision or access site. The instrument driver driving the elongate member is aligned with the access site using a device, such as a stabilizer, as described in pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/174,563 (publication number US2012/0071895), which is herein incorporated by reference. However, significant time is spent aligning the instrument driver with the insertion site using the stabilizer. The typical process requires the user to “train” the instrument driver with the location of the access site prior to loading the elongate member at the start of a procedure. This training process involves advancing the instrument driver forward to mark an access site position. Once the instrument driver has been trained, it must then be retracted to a starting position to load on the elongate member. The purpose of this training process is to notify the instrument driver of the location of the access site, such that when it is advancing later with the elongate member attached, it has a known target location. This training process is not a preferred process, because it is time consuming prior to each robotic procedure. It is akin to doing a trial run of each robotic procedure before the start of the procedure. In addition, once the instrument driver has been trained with the access site location, and once the stabilizer is adhered to the insertion site of the patient, the stabilizer cannot be repositioned, even if the patient moves and the instrument driver needs to be repositioned. Further, it is difficult to adhere the stabilizer to skin that is damp, moist or flaccid, for example due to age or weight of the patient.
Thus, there is a need for a new and useful system and method for aligning an elongate member with an access site. This invention provides such a new and useful system and method.